Not really, Thesys is a technology provider to many firms. Providers include financial services firms, trading companies and regulation authorities. If the SEC purchased the technology (Or spend more money to build it themselves) they would be ridiculed for having inferior technology.
The point is that the people providing the technology have an interest in the SEC not deciding to push for additional, non-HFT friendly market rules.
Is it possible that there's no way to get it besides from a company which might/probably/definitely have a conflict of interest? Yes. Does that somehow negate said conflict of interest? No.
